Day: March 16, 2011

Finding and Blessing Your Home

by Bronwynn Forrest Torgerson

Spring is in the air, and the nesting urge has begun. Here is a light-hearted and airy house-finding and house-blessing ritual for people who know in their bones that it’s time to seek out a home of their own. You’ve long outgrown your parents’ nest and passed the nomadic apartment dweller phase. The new you longs for stability and a place to call home. You want your name on a mailbox, invitations to homeowners’ association meetings. You covet a mantel on which to display Grandma Madison’s china or Grandpa Rossman’s musket. You yearn for trees you can get to know over many seasons and neighbors you can count on, and you have your resources all in a row. This springtime ritual can help sharpen the focus and bring your dream house into the land of manifest reality.

Do your mundane homework first. Check the listings and property values, and listen up for real estate agents that are real wizards at cinching a deal and taking your priorities to heart. Then enter the magickal realms…

House-Hunting Ritual

For the house-hunting ritual, you will need:

A bird’s nest (Warning: shakest thou not the nests from the trees, but go ye into craft stores instead, where such things await in great bounty!)

A hollowed-out and dried egg that you can write on with a fine-point marking pen

A gold candle

A house representation

A piece of parchment paper

A small fire laid of straw and twigs

Make a simple altar outdoors, with those things important to your tradition. For your house representation, many possibilities exist. Do you own a Monopoly game? Pluck a green plastic house from the box. Have a Yule decoration shaped like a gingerbread house? That will do fine. You can also simply draw a house outline on the parchment paper, leaving room for your list of specs. Don’t worry if it’s not perfect. Love and the universe will make it so. On the egg, write “My new home.” You can add your name, date and runes or other magickal sigils if you want.

Now comes your shopping list. Be as specific as you can, while keeping a healthy amount of realism in play. Where should the house be, in conjunction to work, school, culture, family, etc? Envision your ideal floor plan, describing it in words. Is there a yard? A garden space? Is the place environmentally friendly? How big is the garage? What would you like to be within strolling distance of? For price range, you might want to give two figures — the first being what you’d prefer to pay, and the second being the most you can go.

When you are done, roll up your parchment paper so that it’s a thin enough scroll to be inserted through the open ends of the hollowed-out egg. Where else would a dream house hatch? Cast the circle in your way, lastly lighting the gold candle and invoke your patron deity, or whomever you feel most likely to help you in this rite. You may wish to call upon the Goddess in her guise as bird goddess, ancient mother of us all, from whom the egg of the world was laid. Other hearthfire keepers might include Juno, Vesta, Brigit or Hestia. Nordic types may turn to Frigga as queen mother of Asgard, or even to good friend Thor, said to gladly bless a new home and to party with the best. A suggested invocation might be:

By the spark within Your breast,Feel my longing for my nest.Grant that I, contented, dwellBy sacred words and ancient spell.So mote it be!

Holding the egg cupped in your hands, and speak aloud your dearest wishes and desires for your home, including the timeframe in which you hope to find it. Kiss the egg gently and lay it in the nest, thanking Deity for making it hatch with its otherworldly, all-knowing magick. Lay the nest atop the twigs and straw you will use to kindle the fire, then light the spark. As the nest, egg, and your vision burn, know that your mental blueprints are rising to the heavens where your Hallowed House Hunter is seeing them clearly and already beginning to discern where your perfect home might be.

Close the circle in your way, but allow the gold candle to burn out. If that is not possible all in one night, pinch it out and relight it for the next several nights until the candle is gone.

Get yourself a cardboard box and pack some unneeded things away. This signals the universe that you are becoming mobile and can take occupancy of your new home as soon as the closing documents are signed.

House-Blessing Ritual

Huzzah! The Old Ones and your banker have coming shining through! You dance a wild jig, sign a million papers and are petrified and exhilarated. You are now a homeowner! For this house-blessing ritual, you will need:

A white taper candle

Blessing oil (your choice of scent)

Sage or incense

A crystal dish or clear bowl

Bells

The first New Moon after you have keys in hand and have unpacked enough things to live sanely from day to day, invite friends over to bless your new home. Ask each to bring you a coin from the happiest place they have visited recently — so that your home might be blessed with happiness and prosperity — and a bell to ring for mirth and to summon the fey folk forth.

Light the candle, and trace an invoking pentagram at every entrance, asking that truth, benevolence and harmony enter in. You may wish to add an extra wish for great sex, creativity, personal growth and new opportunities, or other heart’s desires. Hand your favorite blessing oil to a special friend, and have him or her bless each reflective surface by drawing the same invoking pentagram in oil and expressing the same wish. Burn some sage or your favorite magickal incense, inviting all unseen creatures of goodly heart and helpful hands to come and dwell herein.

After this is accomplished, guests may deposit their coins one by one into the dish, telling of the happy place in which the coin made its way into their pockets. Never spend these coins, but rather look upon this hoard as treasure of the heart and a certain guarantee that you will never be destitute.

Now those guests who have bells should go merrily ringing and dancing through the place, proclaiming lighthearted wishes for you as they do so: “I wish for your cat to love it here! I wish you incredible sexual romps! May nothing you cook in this kitchen ever burn! May there always be wine in your fridge!” Let unbounded imagination bring forth creative, graphic, heartfelt and humorous wishes. Well-wishers may shout “huzzah!” or “so mote it be!”

Now it is time to sing to the house itself, blessing it with your hopes and praise. What better tune than the 1980s classic rock tune, “Our House,” by Graham Nash? Here are some magickally-modified lyrics, penned by yours truly, to serenade your new home:

Oh my/your house is a very, very, very fine house!With friends in every chairAnd love beyond compare.Yes my/your house is a very, very, very fine house!

Oh my/your house is a very, very, very fine house!Prosperity aboundsAnd hearty laughter sounds.Oh my/your house is a very, very, very fine house!

Oh my/your house is a very, very, very fine house!Health, wealth, good fortune too.All blessings come to you.For my/hour house is a very, very, very fine house!

This would be the perfect time for a toast, to you, to the God/dess, to your new home, and to many years of happiness together.

Witch Bottle

by Amanda Silvers

A witch bottle or ball is a protective warding device, to be used when you are wanting to keep away enemies. It is very effective and I have had very good luck with it, especially when living in high crime areas.

You will need at least five to ten of these things:

a sturdy bottle with a wide mouth

a cork that fits the bottle

bones

broken pieces of mirror

bunch of broken glass

bunch of needles and pins

globs of black wax

handful of glitter

handful of rocks

lint

lion, bear or wolf fur

nails

pictures of demons

staples

tangled hair

tangled thread, black

teeth

your own urine

First, clean and clear yourself the area and all the ingredients. Cast your circle in your normal way, ask the elements, the god and goddess and the fey for their assistance in creating this ward. Ask for clarity of purpose and focus on being completely protected from all types of harm.

When you are finished casting your circle, bless all the ingredients with your purpose of protection.

Next, take the items, one by one that you have assembled and hold them up before the bottle, state the individual purpose of each;, such as; “glitter to attract my enemies to this bottle.” “Needles and pins to poke those who would do me harm.” “Urine to repel attackers.” “Broken glass to cut my enemies.” “Thread to tangle any who would do me harm.”

It is good to plan your order prior to the ritual and you can tell a little story, like; “Enemies may come close to see themselves in the mirrors or they may be attracted into the bottle by the glitter, then they get tangled in the thread, cut by the glass, pricked by the pins and needles and drowned in the urine, once their negative energy is caught in this bottle it may not escape. They are scared away from me forever. I am safe from all harm.

As you make the statements insert each thing into the bottle. Once everything is inside, melt the black wax and cork the bottle using the wax as a sealant. Inscribe your rune on the cork and bury the bottle somewhere close to your front door. You must bury it far enough under the earth that no one finds it.

Make sure and make your intention clear, and say this or better for the best and highest good of all. This is a very powerful spell, I hope you never have to invoke it.

Shower Your Cares Away

by Sylvana SilverWitch

Much more than earth, fire or air, the healing aspects of water are easy for me to identify with, maybe partly because I am a double water sign — Pisces sun with Cancer rising. I seem to think about water most of the time. It seems I am either washing myself, my hands or face, or drinking or sitting in it. I am very much attuned to the properties of water, and I find that if I stray very far away from a large body of water, I am unhappy and I just don’t feel right.

Even if you don’t have signs in water, as a human being you’re naturally attuned to water, because the great majority of your body is made of it. In a way, water is the easiest element for us to connect with, because we can easily submerge ourselves in it, unlike in fire or earth. When we do immerse ourselves in water, we’re usually conscious of doing so, unlike our experience of immersing in air.

Following is a quick cleansing meditation that makes use of this natural connection to water and that is designed to be used in the shower.

If you are one of those people who can’t seem to find the time to meditate, or if you ever need a psychic cleanup in a hurry, this meditation might be perfect for you. It takes only a very few minutes once you get the process memorized. It really works and can be very helpful, and it is easy to do every day as a part of your normal routine, since most of us shower or bathe every day (or at least I hope we do). I do it every day, all the time — no matter where I am.

This meditation involves cleansing and running energy through your body while in the process of cleansing your body by taking a shower. I make use of the actual physicality of washing in the shower and the motion of the water as a focus for the cleansing and healing meditation.

The first few times, try it when you are not too rushed, so you have time to get a feel for how it works for you.

First, get into the shower and do what ever you need to do that may take some attention to detail, such as washing your hair or shaving. Then do your usual grounding and centering. Next, visualize yourself standing in the middle of a wonderful, warm, healing waterfall, golden sun radiant on you, mist glistening up brilliant rainbows and water gently cascading down around and over you. Visualize the water delicately caressing every part of your body with cleansing, nurturing energy.

Smell the warmth of the water as it runs in rivulets over your body. Imagine you are in a tropical paradise, a magickal place that you have come for healing your body and spirit. Hear the sounds of the water rushing over you.

Contemplate your day and week and anything seemingly important that has happened during them. Feel throughout your body and notice if there are any places that your energy feels “stuck” or heavy. Think about your physical body and how it has been feeling. Search with your awareness your whole body: your bones, muscles, nerves, skin and organs. Notice any place that seems to need attention. Use your perception to observe anything that seems out of place or wrong to you.

I also like to take this time to look and feel for energy “cords” connecting me to other people. Cords are energetic connections to people and energies that I am not responsible for and don’t need to carry around. They look like literal cords, or sometimes more like cables, between us and those we come into contact with, especially loved ones, friends, co-workers and yes, even enemies!

When you get a sense of what energies you might want to disperse, then work on dispersing them by beginning to propel the energy around and through you. Dissipate it by gathering it and sending it washing down your body with the water into the drain. Imagine or picture it being cleansed from you — your energy body then transparent, shining pure and clear.

Think about being cleansed of all of the anger, resentment and negativity that has been thrown at you or that you have picked up from other people or situations and that you have carried around. These energies can cause disease and stress. Anger, resentment and negativity all may harm you if you don’t dissipate and neutralize them from time to time.

Understand that by cleaning your body and using your sponge and soap and at the same time imagining “cleaning” your body and energy, that you “scrub” yourself clean, both body and aura. Then ground out the energy with the water.

After you have finished cleansing, see the water flowing completely through you — healing and nurturing all the parts of yourself, body, soul, mind, heart and spirit.

I have found that if I miss my “shower meditation,” I do not feel grounded and I have trouble concentrating and focusing on the matters at hand. I sometimes have physical symptoms and just don’t feel good if I miss my water meditation. Try it, see how it works for you and adapt it if you need to.

Sensibility is said to be neither good nor evil in itself, but in its application. Sometimes we just “out-sensible” ourselves. In the course of years we come to see the pattern of the truly sensible. What have we at this moment that really means anything? Does it give us happiness? Did it once seem most impractical? Was it worth fighting for?

The intellectual strives for knowledge and in his absorption leaves the world but hardly leaves a vacancy. The materialistic must have everything at the price of peace, and their possessions decay but never their chaotic souls. And the insecure forfeit the most minute comforts to save for that rainy day. Happiness would have been greater and far more lasting if the fund had been smaller and used as an opportunity fund.

The fine line of sensibility can be most elusive but it seems to be more clearly seen when we relax and quit shoving to get there. If the place we desire is meant for us, it will come when we learn the way isn’t always sharp and direct and by demand.

“Each of us must know in our minds and believe in our hearts that even though we are different, you are like me and I am like you.”

–Larry P. Aitken, CHIPPEWA

One of the definitions of humility is having an awareness of one’s own character defects. To recognize and acknowledge that one has imperfections is being humble. We should never pray for ourselves unless by doing so it would help another person. To have self-importance puts self first and this is not humble. We each have strengths and we each have weaknesses. Both the strengths and weaknesses are sacred. Life is sacred. We learn sacred things from weaknesses also. Therefore, all lives are developed through trial and error, strength and weakness, ups and downs, gains and losses-all of these are part of life and life is sacred.

March 16 – Daily Feast

March 16 – Daily Feast

It seems there is often too much of one thing and not enough of the other. Balance has a way of disappearing when we need it most. But it is our fault for thinking that once we have things all working together it will stay in balance without our having to do anything else. Nothing is so set that it will never change. We should never give in to challenge that throw us off center. Wait a little while. Something may be working that we don’t know about. Don’t accept everything as it appears. It can change in a moment’s notice and swing our way. Very often the law of nonresistance is at work here. Some of our best decisions are based on standing still until we can get a true picture.

The Hanged Man Reversed
The card of false prophecy and time wasted. The reversed Hanged Man represents a preoccupation with the worldly and wasted energy.

Wunjo
Wunjo reversed may represent a basic discord and failure in your life. Possibly good fortune is not looking down on you at this time. If so it must be remembered that Wunjo also represents change, which could mean your bad luck is soon to change.

Scorpio the Scorpion
This aspect of your life will be strongly influenced by a person who is jealous, resentful, compulsive, obsessive, secretive and obstinate. This person is a relative.

Your Daily Influences represent events and challenges the current day will present for you. They may represent opportunities you should be ready to seize. Or they may forewarn you of problems you may be able to avoid or lessen. Generally it is best to use them as tips to help you manage your day and nothing more.

The Chakras represent the seven primary energy hubs in the body. Life force energy is constantly flowing in and out of these centers. Just as the cosmos is constantly changing, so too are the levels of energy absorbed and radiated by our Chakra centers. The graph below is a representation of the quantities of Chakra energies available today.

Sahasrara:

12%

60%

Vishuddha:

76%

Anahata:

7%

Manipura:

96%

Svadhisthana:

96%

Muladhara:

62%

Legend:Sahasrara – The Crown Chakra represents energies associated with cosmic consciousness, spirituality, knowledge, wisdom and inner peace.Ajna – The Third Eye Chakra represents energies focused on both physical and spiritual vision. Psychic powers resonate from the Ajna Chakra, as well as your image of the Cosmos as a whole (the big picture) and the many nuances that make your journey unique.Vishuddha – Throat Chakra is the energy center associated with communication and creativity. Your energy to express yourself verbally and creatively are derived from the Vishuddha Chakra.Anahata – The Heart Chakra’s energy is concentrated on issues concerning your emotions. This energy fuels your power to love, feel compassion and maintain balance between disparate aspects of your being.Manipura – The Power Chakra provides the energy that fuels our strength of will, individuality and sense of self-worth.Svadhisthana – The Spleen or Sacral Chakra supplies the energy we use emotionally and sexually. This is the energy used to connect to others.Muladhara – The Root or Base Chakra furnishes the energy used to create and maintain our foundation. This is the energy that keeps us on firm ground and provides us with the basic skills to uphold a place in the world.